The Old Tobacco Shop Part 20

While this was going on, the poor captives were able to examine their chief captor more carefully. They remarked with surprise the fine quality of the handkerchief which he had handed to his man, and they were even more surprised to note the whiteness and fineness of the linen of his shirt. His breeches were of blue velvet, and his sash and the kerchief which bound his head were of crimson silk. On the fingers of each hand he wore three or four diamond rings, which sparkled brilliantly in the half-darkness. His stockings were plainly of silk, and the buckles at his knees and on his shoes were of polished silver, outlined in diamonds. His face was hard and cruel, but its unpleasantness may have been due to a long scar which crossed his mouth from his right cheek to his chin. When he smiled, as he did in referring to the lady in distress, the scar gave to his face a singularly evil expression.

Taking the wet handkerchief from Ketch's hand, he knelt beside Aunt Amanda and bathed her face and wrists, slapping her cheeks and temples smartly now and then with the handkerchief, and changing her position so that her head lay lower than her body. After he had worked over her with much care for a few moments, Aunt Amanda opened her eyes. She was staring at the frightful crooked smile of a strange man with rings in his ears and a kerchief on his head. She started up, bewildered.

"Where's Toby? Where am I? Who are you?"

"Captain Lingo, ma'am," said the strange man, "at your service."

"Let me up," said Aunt Amanda. She struggled to her feet, rejecting the a.s.sistance offered by the ear-ring'd man, and stood facing him, her bedraggled bonnet very much over her right ear. "Who are you?" she said again.

"Your humble servant, ma'am," said the strange man, smiling his crooked smile. "Captain Lingo, by name. A gentleman adventurer of the high seas.

Owner of the treasure which you have discovered here in our little retreat. Known here on the Spanish Main as the Scourge of Ships, and loyal servant of his blessed Majesty King James, whom the saints defend.

Your obedient humble servant to command." He made the lady a very courtly bow.

Toby whispered into Freddie's ear. "He can't be so terrible bad, not with all that polite way of talking. Don't be afraid. We'll be all right with this pirate. Who on earth is King James?"

Aunt Amanda was also much relieved by the pirate's polite address.

"As long as you are my obedient servant," said she, "I'll thank you to help us to get out of here as soon as possible. We didn't want to come in the first place, and we are in a hurry to get out."

Captain Lingo laughed heartily. "They are in a hurry to get out, lads,"

he said to his companions; and at this they all laughed uproariously.

"I don't see anything to laugh at," said Aunt Amanda. "If we don't get out of here soon, we'll catch our death of cold."

This made Captain Lingo laugh more heartily than before. "Ha! ha! ha!

Their death of cold! That would be a rare fine thing, but a bit too slow, lads, eh?" And the other six laughed again, so that the walls of the chamber echoed with their mirth.

"What do you mean by too slow?" said Aunt Amanda.

"Madam," said Captain Lingo, "we are a little pressed for time. We really could not wait for you to die of colds."

"What?" said Aunt Amanda faintly, her feeling of confidence beginning to ooze away. "Do you mean to say----?"

"Madam," said the pirate, seriously, "I will put it to you plainly.

Our treasure, which you have discovered, has taken a great deal of hard work to acc.u.mulate. We really couldn't bear to lose it. The people of this island, and a great many other people besides, have been trying for many years to find it. You have not only found it, but you have even gone so far as to open certain of our bags, in spite of the warning posted above your heads. Now picture to yourselves, dear madam and gentlemen, what consequences would certainly ensue if you were to leave--here--ahem!--alive."

"Oh!" gasped Aunt Amanda. "Leave--here--alive!"

"All the fruits of our industry would be lost, and our own safety would be imperilled. You will readily see that, of course. 'Tis a pity so many will have to die at once, for it will mess up the place very badly, and I always endeavor to be neat. But why, _why_ did so many of you come at once? Couldn't you have come, say two at a time? It would have made so much less trouble."

"Ho!" said Mr. Punch. "Hif we 'ad only stopped at 'ome, hall of us!"

"However, I do not wish you to feel too keenly the trouble you are putting us to; my brave lads will cheerfully put up with the inconvenience, though I must confess the amount of blood will be quite unusual, and so many bodies will be troublesome to bury. I wish it were possible to have you walk the plank. However, pray do not bother too much on our account."

"We weren't thinking about you at all," said Toby. "We were thinking about ourselves."

"Oh," said Captain Lingo, in a tone of disappointment. "I beg your pardon; I misunderstood. At any rate, we will now prepare for our little ceremony. If there are any trifling articles of jewelry and the like, I will be pleased to----"

"But this boy!" cried Toby. "And this lady! You don't mean to--you can't mean----"

"Not for worlds," said Captain Lingo, "would I be rude to a lady. I trust you will find my conduct towards the lady beyond reproach. There shall be no rudeness of any kind. Merely a quick stroke, and all will be over. No violence, no roughness of any kind; not a word to offend the most sensitive ears. A single stroke, and the affair is done. And let me tell you, I have here with me a Pract.i.tioner who is very expert in this sort of business: our friend Ketch, in fact, who was so kind as to wet the handkerchief for the lady. I a.s.sure you that you are in great luck to fall into the hands of such a Pract.i.tioner; he will make it as pleasant for you as possible; one stroke only, I promise you. With one stroke of a cutla.s.s, he is able to slice off a head as neatly as you could do it with a broadaxe; there are very few who can do it with a cutla.s.s, let me tell you that. Many men have become famous by being operated on by Ketch. I remember a case--However," he said, looking about him as if considering something, and speaking rather to himself than to the others, "it would be difficult to bury the bodies here, and the light is not very good. I think, yes, I think it had better be done outside. You are already wet, and I trust that another immersion will not inconvenience you too much. Lads," he said to his six men, "put on the rubber suits, and help our friends under the fall. Look alive, now."

The six men immediately ran to their rubber suits and began to put them on. While they were doing this, Toby put one arm about Freddie and the other about Aunt Amanda. She lowered her head to his shoulder for a moment, but she soon raised it, and standing very erect she said, "Very well, if it must be, it must. It's easy to see that this bloodthirsty villain means every word he says; but I ain't going to whimper; I'm the captain, and I order that everybody keep up his courage, and wait and see what will happen."

"Ay, ay, ma'am," said the Churchwarden.

"Do you know," whispered the Old Codger with the Wooden Leg, "I believe that we are in a good deal of--er--danger."

Freddie put his hand in Toby's, and held it tight. "You keep close to me if you can," said Toby, squeezing his hand. "We may be rescued at the last minute; you never can tell. Don't lose your nerve."

Freddie was trembling with fear, and the hand which held Toby's was as cold as ice; but he said nothing; the others were being brave, and he resolved that he would be as brave as the rest, up to the very last. He began to think of his mother and his father, and to wonder what would become of them if he should be--but he forced himself not to think of that; he pressed his lips tight together, and commanded himself to be brave.

The six pirates returned, clad in their baggy rubber suits, and looking very much like bears walking on their hind legs. They brought with them Captain Lingo's suit, and helped him to get into it. When he was encased like the others, with only his hands and face showing, he said:

"Now, madam, I will a.s.sist you to the fall."

"We'll attend to that," put in Toby, quickly. "Come on, Mr. Punch."

Aunt Amanda's cane having been lost, she found more difficulty in walking than formerly, but Toby and Mr. Punch supported her to such good effect that she kept up with the others very well on their march into the water towards the fall. All, except the pirates, shivered as the cold water came again around their knees, and they looked with fear upon the tumbling cataract which they were required to go under. There was no help for it, however; the seven pirates surrounded them and persuaded them to go on. They stood in a forlorn group in the quiet water near the foot of the fall.

"Now, madam," said Captain Lingo, "I will help you under."

Toby and Mr. Punch, feeling that the pirate knew the way better than they did, resigned Aunt Amanda to his care, not without some fear that the villain might deliberately drown her on the way through. He made her kneel in the water, and then lie flat; and with a strong arm he pulled her under the water-fall and out of sight.

"You're next," said a deep voice to Freddie, and Ketch the Pract.i.tioner seized him and plunged with him under the water; and in an instant they had disappeared beyond the fall.

One after another the miserable, shivering victims were a.s.sisted by the pirates under the water, and one by one disappeared. The Old Codger with the Wooden Leg was the last, and one of the pirates returned for him.

When he had followed the others, the great half-dark chamber remained as it had been before, in its empty solitude and gloom, without an ear to hear the steady rush of water pouring incessantly down its fall.

On the outer side of that rushing fall was a scene very different indeed. The pirates and their captives stood under a blazing sun, looking across a wide and beautiful landscape. Behind them, in the side of a high hill overgrown with bushes, was the hole by which they had come forth, and across the inside of this hole was the curtain of falling water. Freddie wondered how anyone had ever had the courage to plunge for the first time through that curtain into the unknown dark.

The heat of the sun was very grateful, and the clothing of the soaked travellers began to dry perceptibly at once. The pirates took off their rubber suits.

Beneath the observers the ground sloped down into a broad valley, chequered with gra.s.s meadows and dotted with trees. To their left, as they gazed out across the landscape, the ground rose from the valley by easy stages to a great height, no doubt forming the landward side of the black cliff which bordered the ocean.

To the right, the country rolled gently away from the valley in a vast unbroken forest, a shimmering green ocean of tree-tops as far as the eye could see. Far, far off where the forest rose in a kind of mound, Freddie thought he could see what looked like the top of a round tower, just emerging above the haze of trees.

The pirates and their captives were standing on a little gra.s.sy plateau, on which were great boulders here and there, and a few wide leafy trees.

Two or three fallen logs were lying near the edge of the plateau, where it began to slope downward.

Captain Lingo stepped out of his rubber suit, spread out his fine white handkerchief on a boulder to dry, and twiddled his moist fingers daintily in the air, after which he blew on his finger-nails and polished them on his shirt-sleeves.

"We are now ready," said he, "for the ceremony. Ketch, thy cutla.s.s."

Ketch drew his cutla.s.s from his belt and handed it to the captain. It glittered wickedly in the sunlight. The captain ran his thumb along its edge, and nodded his head with satisfaction.

"It will do," said he. "One stroke for each will be quite sufficient.

We will now proceed with the ceremony."